With the holidays around the corner, as college students it is easy to be swept away by the promise of almost three weeks of doing close to nothing, eating more food than one can imagine and getting to see family and friends that you may not have seen in a long time. But it is also easy to forget those who may not be able to do or have any of these privileges. It is also easy to forget those who are struggling not only to find something they are thankful for, but struggling to get by as well. We could write extensively about the history of the commercialization and the capitalistic roots of the holidays as we know them today. But instead what we should do is use that history to try and change what we know as the conventional holiday season to make it a little more communal and inclusive, and bring it somewhat closer to the spirit of Christmas that we have been taught in school. There are some ways you can improve the lives around you, not just for these holidays but all year round, so you can show gratitude in the most impactful way possible.

On the Oct. 6, 2017, President Donald Trump's administration rolled back yet another Affordable Health Care mandate that outlined coverage for birth control under employer-sponsored healthcare. The backwards legislative action included sweeping guidelines for employers to claim religious exemption from the mandate in the name of “religious freedom” — something which the Trump administration plans to reinstate in full.

Recently,
I haven’t been able to scroll through three posts on Facebook before
encountering yet another video about
how someone mastered the art of applying henna and has been crowned its “master”
by some off-radar media company.

As if the country didn’t have enough
problems in dealing with incompetence and discrimination within our federal
administration, the United States is also currently facing a deadly onslaught
of natural disasters.

There’s been a lot of talk about tuition-free college over the past couple of years, with it being a primary issue on former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders’ platform, San Francisco making public community colleges free, and the state of New York passing legislation that effectively provides middle-class families with free higher education.

Friday’s great health care debacle with H.R. 1628, the American Health Care Act of 2017, was not only a source of troubling anxiety for many people (myself included) during the better part of the day, but also a poignant moment in history that will be remembered for years to come — the beginning of the end of the streams of incessant and rampant lies and empty, question mark-filled promises that are thrown out to the American people.So far, President Donald J. Trump has successfully managed to con America by maintaining a vicious cycle of frivolously spending taxpayer money for personal and unnecessary causes, then deflects the subsequent blame by either tweeting out a ridiculous conspiracy theory cooked up by right-wing personalities and TV networks or blaming the Democrats for failing to support a half-hearted attempt of his to make good on one of his many nationalistic and toxic campaign promises.

With the publication of false terror incidents, the attacks on “fake” news outlets and rants on baseless yet inflammatory claims the man in the Oval Office insists on perpetuating, it seems as though President Donald J. Trump will stop at nothing to constantly put non-white straight, Christian males in a negative light.